


In Contrast To Expectation

by HungryLibrary



Category: RWBY
Genre: F/F, Fluff, first posted on Tumblr, old fic refound, watching things change
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-03
Updated: 2015-11-03
Packaged: 2018-04-29 17:35:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5136629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HungryLibrary/pseuds/HungryLibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>Weiss likes her coffee dark and bitter, her fruits tart and sour.</em><br/>Ruby would rather drink milk with her cookies and hunt battlefields for the sweetest of strawberries.</p><p> </p><p>Or, when people with great differences end up complimenting each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Contrast To Expectation

Ruby is a morning person. Weiss is not.

Weiss gets her revenge watching her partner doze off barely past ten, head drooping and weight slumping across the last half-inch of space between their chairs.

Weiss likes her coffee dark and bitter, her fruits tart and sour.

Ruby would rather drink milk with her cookies and hunt battlefields for the sweetest of strawberries.

Everything about their tastes, their likes, differs so drastically.

One of the very few things they have in common is a love of fighting in skirts, cut short above the knee to leave movements unrestricted. 

They both always rush to defend the style, and some part of Weiss wonders how much is righteous indignation, how much comes from the fear of losing one of the few bits of common ground between them.

Things change, however.

More specifically, Weiss begin to see how much they are starting to change each other.

Ruby falls asleep less often during late night studies.

Coffee will never be a favorite of hers, but she drinks it if Weiss makes it the way she did that first night, and it does help Ruby stay up past ten.

Weiss likewise has realized that early mornings can be beautiful.

They are also chilly and Ruby likes to scoop Weiss up in her cloak as she hustles her out of bed before dawn, never discouraged by icy hands or a bad tempered scowl.

A breakfast the dolt splits a strawberry strewn pancake with Weiss and resignedly accepts half of a tart green apple in return. She introduces Weiss to the idea of dipping cookies into milk. Weiss introduces her to the idea that one of these is not actually a major food group.

Ruby’s notes are still messy but she does trouble herself to take them down instead of doodling all through class.

And Weiss lets the occasional scribble slide, sometimes even cracking a reluctant smile when Ruby passes a particularly terrible one to her during class.

Ruby is the first one to honestly laugh at Weiss’s first attempt at a pun, which in retrospect,  _might_  have been somewhat poorly timed.

Weiss uses her as a sounding board after that.

Ideas for purposefully terrible jokes and wordplay are whispered to Ruby whenever they strike Weiss- not so much out of a trust for her taste, Weiss is relatively sure her partner is biased and would find anything she said funny, provided it wasn’t cruel.

It is a boost to Weiss’s confidence, though, and plenty of puns she will never share with others get passed between the two of them.

Most of them make Ruby giggle or snort. Once Weiss told one during dinner that left Ruby spraying milk across the table, completely soaking Jaune, and it took a full five minutes before she could talk clearly enough to apologize.

The amount of pride Weiss still feels over the incident is, frankly, embarrassing.

Not embarrassing enough to keep her from trying parse out how to provoke a similar reaction again, but it’s not an endeavor she will ever willingly admit to.

Almost as if Ruby sensed Weiss’s inner mortification and wanted to level the scales, a few days later Ruby admits to a little secret of her own.

At least a third of her journal is full of poetry. Poetry of the self-made variety.

Weiss’s manners are too refined to allow her to snatch at the book, but she certainly doesn’t hide her curiosity. And after a few moments and several solemnly sworn oaths to  _never tell anyone especially not Yang_ , Ruby gingerly flicks open to a page and hands it over, face so red she nearly blends in with her hood.

The journal is thin and light and still somehow Weiss feels the weight of it pressing into her.

Something not ever Ruby’s sister has seen, she is showing to her. Asking for her opinion . Trusting her with a side she likes to keep hidden.

Weiss eyes the page with a carefully neutral face.

There is no way she will react badly to what Ruby has written, whatever Ruby has written.

Weiss is determined on that point and scared because her mask is rusty from disuse and the two of them have grown so close she’s not confident even her best false smile would fool Ruby for long.

It’s with a double heartbeat Weiss read the first stanza.

And it’s with relief she realize that, somehow, her dolt of partner actually  _does_  have a way with words.

Weiss tells her as much, amending of course that her knowledge of poetry is not very extensive beyond the required classics, Blake would be a better judge, she is sure.

Ruby collapses back across her bed with a shaky laugh, trembling hands pressed to her face, half hiding her grin.

And something about all of it makes Weiss see the appeal in learning to paint with words.

This is a moment she would like to always remember.

The two of them still defend their combat skirts with a proud vehemence but any desperation is long gone. 

There are so many little compromises between the two of them now, so many silly secrets shared, each tying them both together surer than any similarities ever would. There is no room left to feel insecure. 

Once Weiss had wondered how such different people would manage to stay together for four whole years.

Now, looking to life beyond Beacon, it’s impossible for her to picture anything without seeing Ruby’s place in it too.

Weiss thinks Ozpin would be quite smug if he knew.

The thought would probably be more irritating if she didn’t feel so grateful.


End file.
